Booher: Allen plays the blame game after loss

Missouri State coach puts responsibility for ugly loss on players

Kary BOOHER Kary Booher. Nathan Papes/News-Leader

Take a wild guess as to who shouldered the blame after this one? Because it sure wasn't Missouri State coach Terry Allen.

The longtime football coach hit the postgame news conference Saturday after arguably the ugliest loss - and certainly the worst play-calling showcase at Plaster Sports Complex - and promptly threw his starting quarterback under the bus.

At one point, he was asked how to reverse yet another 0-4 start. Said Allen, "Get your quarterback in a position not to beat you."

And when asked why the Bears didn't send in their goal-line offense on a fourth-and-3 inside Southern Illinois' 5-yard line early in the game - it was the moment to make a statement, to change the narrative of the game, possibly the season - Allen instead singled out his running back, a redshirt freshman no less.

"But he went on the wrong side of the center," Allen said.

Complete. Utter. Hogwash.

The Bears' 14-6 loss to conference rival Southern Illinois should fall squarely on the shoulders of Allen and offensive coordinator Rob Christophel. Their play-calling wasn't simply questionable. It was atrocious.

Worse, Allen's decision to yank Mizzou transfer quarterback Ashton Glaser late in the third quarter now will have some in town talking about a quarterback controversy.

Don't take the bait.

The Bears' offense had no rhythm, no consistency and, as far as I could tell, no one on the ready to play the role of the bruiser fullback eager to plow the road and help a young rusher and newcomer QB.

In essence, Allen did not put his team in a position to have success.

There was senior left guard Harrison Menke in the postgame interview with a dejected look.

Sitting beside him was disappointed redshirt freshman running back Ryan Heaston, who manned up and offered a mea culpa on the drive that could have pulled the Bears to within 14-10.

On the fourth-and-3 play in the second quarter, said Heaston, "I missed the hole."

He shouldn't have taken the blame. He was 1 yard short.

But where was the fullback to help him there? Or on a third-and-3 play just moments earlier, since it went nowhere? Or what about a fullback on a third-and-5 at the 10 on the previous series, when Mikael Cooper-Falls was left to do the work and didn't make it? The Bears settled for a field goal.

This is what was difficult to understand about Saturday: Allen and the Bears had a beatable opponent in town and needed something positive before reaching the teeth of the schedule. But Allen did not help his team make the statement it so badly needed.

But he sure made the statements afterward.

After the game, Allen acknowledged the Bears do have a goal-line offense with three tight ends and a fullback, former Fair Grove standout Caleb Schaffitzel.

Yet he defended the fourth-and-3 call, saying, "The guy just missed a hole." And he later added, "On this situation, I don't second-guess the call by our coordinator one bit."

But that was all after Allen ripped Glaser, who deserved better considering he volunteered to come here and help solve a quarterback mess.

"I was a little frustrated with the quarterback at halftime," Allen said, and then later added, "And then some decision-making - when he got sacked in the third quarter, if we'd have done as we practiced, he would have had the ball out of his hands, he wouldn't have gotten sacked and we would have had a 10-yard completion."

That was convenient. Six of the Bears' first seven plays from scrimmage to open the game - this covered two different series, leading to the interception - were pass plays, not a mix of runs to establish a tone.

And on the Bears' first series of the third quarter, after the defense forced a punt, Missouri State had a third-and-1 at its own 48. The call? Some kind of weird option play for the slow-footed Glaser. It blew up.

Overall, it was clearly a case of Allen and Christophel obilvious to their personnel on offense. You can't shoehorn still-young talent into an offensive playbook more suited for a seasoned, or more talented roster. Yet ...

"The plays were not so much the fault for the quarterback. It was his execution," Allen said.

At which point, Allen tried to walk it back.

"And, one thing, I am never one to put the blame on the quarterback position because I was a quarterback and I know all the responsibilities that quarterbacks have out there," Allen said. "But there are two or three things that you just absolutely have to do as a quarterback ?"